Summary

"What I Have Been Doing Lately" is part of author Jamaica Kincaid's first work, At the Bottom of the River, a collection of short stories first published in 1983.

This story, like the other works in At the Bottom of the River, is told in the first person. As the story begins, the narrator is lying in bed. In response to a ringing doorbell, the narrator runs downstairs to see who might be calling. Finding no one there, the narrator steps outside to find that it is either drizzling rain or the air is filled with a sort of damp dust; in either case, the narrator describes the taste of the air as being similar to government school ink.

Next, the narrator looks north and south before deciding to walk north. As the narrator walks, we learn the narrator is not wearing shoes...